Last fall’s TV season opened with a great to-do about a new series, Soap. The to-do, in fact, began before the season did, when word leaked out that the show would feature things like the attempted seduction of a priest. Looking back on the premature fuss, Dwight Whitney, in TV Guide, pointed out acidly that none of the protestors had seen what they were protesting. To which one might retort that if you hear that an act of intercourse is going to be televised, you can object without tuning in to see whether the participants adopt the missionary position. Don’t get me wrong: I don’t mind if sodomy is explicitly depicted, as long as it is done in good taste.
Still, Mr. Whitney had a certain point. The butt of Soap is of course the soap opera, with its anxious invention (and exploitation) of petty perversities. Not only Catholics but many
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